Tuesday, March 16 - Friday, March 19

This past week was killer stressful. On top of the challenging work at school, my computer died on me...

My classmates can attest to the stress zits on my worried face.

On Tuesday we had our first real team work challenge. We broke into teams of 8 to create 15 identical plated desserts. We had to use phyllo dough, make a tempered chocolate garnish and to be honest, I cant remember the rest of the regulations, that's how fuzzy I am. I digress. Here is our take on a re-invented Neapolitan. We used flourless chocolate cake on the bottom, a strawberry Diplomat (a really smooth and tasty mousse), with a graham cracker layer which was topped with more mousse, creme Chantilly and white chocolate. Our sauces were chocolate and a berry coulis...



Here is what our table looked like. We teamed up with three of the girls from the other class.




On Wednesday, we did what Chef Rocque called "A Reality Check" otherwise known as the "Top Chef Challenge."

We were given six ingredients and had to use four of them to create a plated dessert. We had to break into teams of two so Vicki and I worked together.

Here is what we got to choose from:

Fresh yeast

oats

any kind of berry

pears

red wine

olive oil

I meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeean.

So we went with an oat tart shell filled with a raspberry curd (ahem, Chef asked for our recipe :-) ), pears that we poached in red wine and simple syrup, chocolate sauce, rum caramel sauce, almond "comet," topped with a raspberry.

Here is what some of the other teams created:

One day before class, Monica found a pair of roller blades in JM's trunk which she immediately put on and started tooling around the parking lot in... Having made PLENTY of fun of me in the past for owning a pair, Pharyn grabbed mine out of the CRV to join Monica.

This thoroughly made my day.

For our next challenge, we were broken down into teams of four to create a dessert that utilized chocolate fondant cake, two sauces, an ice cream and marshmallows.

Me, Monica, Pharyn and Vicki created chocolate fondant cake topped with caramelized bananas, a peanut butter marshmallow topped with a tempered chocolate cigarette and a rum caramel sauce with a banana creme anglaise. Chef said if he had to suggest something to change, he wouldn't change anything.

Just sayin.

Friday was yet another plated dessert challenge (just remembering my week brings the feeling of a not-so-pleasant clogged pore on my face) where we were required to make two sauces, use apples or pears and phyllo dough. We hollowed out and baked our apple in cinnamon, sugar and butter and made a phyllo cup for it. We made caramel rum sauce again cause, well, its awesome, chocolate, cinnamon ice cream that everyone in class thought was super tasty, and topped it with a sugar coil.

This past weekend has been about putting my portfolio for this class together (major thanks to Jeff for letting me use his computer and printer ALL day Saturday to do so) while biting my nails over the three and a half days of finals that looms ahead of me...

Monday, March 15th

Today we had our practical where we had to recreate the plated dessert that we made last week... This time, I made a white chocolate cup and a cocoa transfer design on the side and a dark chocolate filigree with the same pattern...



After the very long day (since for some reason, NONE of us got sleep last night... Me due to stupid Terroni which has now gotten me sick for the second time), we all headed to Monica's home in Moorepark for game night! After a few rousing games of Catch Phrase and Taboo, we finally got to meet Monica's awesome Dad (who walked in with a stogie) (amazing) and Mom, Janet (who we all couldn't wait to meet), who loved seeing all our shoes by the front door:

Monday, March 8th - Friday, March 12th

Phew!!! The week started off a tad stressful... While we are delighted to have Chef Gomez again, but the school blended us with another class who is also learning Plated Desserts so now, instead of 14 of us, there are now 34. We are SO not used to having that many people in a class and its tight and busy and congested and pushy and loud and we have to form lines just to use the ovens and the sinks. As you can imagine, yours truly is NOT thrilled. On the upside, we get the benefits of being taught by their Chef, Chef Rocque, who is absolutely hilarious.

So after a very stressful Monday and a refresher of fruit coulis and creme anglaise, we went out to our favorite burger place, Islands, to celebrate Vicki's 25th birthday!

I ordered the worlds largest beer...



And then we did a very-illegal-in-school-uniform-happy-birthday-Vicki shot:




... Which Monica passed on and instead ordered a chocolate milk shake...





Wednesday we worked on tuile cookies. Thursday we tempered chocolate for the first time and learned how to make chocolate cups and filigrees and we also made a mousse that would go towards plating our first dessert....

So here is my fruit coulis with creme anglaise with my tempered chocolate cup, flourless chocolate cake, chocolate mousse, quenelle of creme Chantilly and chocolate filigree. Phew! It is very important to have a crunch factor in a plated dessert, at least one sauce, a garnish as well as "negative plate space."




And a close up:

Friday we made crepes in teams of two... Vicki and I made a fruit compote to top our crepes which were filled with nutella (drool) and topped with Chantilly creme.

It tasted as good as it looks... So good, in fact, that Vicki and I absolutely devoured our presentation plate and had to make up another identical plate just so we could take pictures...

Monday, March 1st - Friday, March 5th

Hurrah! Its Friday!!

Thank you to those of you who called and emailed, totally antsy to see the cakes!

So without further adieu, here are our wedding cakes! We were graded on many different aspects ranging from piping, texture, flowers, color scheme and fondant coloring.

Here is mine! I chose to make hydrangea, roses and ranunculus, which are my absolute favorite flowers...



Here is a picture of the top of the cake... We were responsible for hand dusting each petal. We worked about 20 hours total on our cakes...

Here is a close up of the flowers on the left side of the cake...

And here are the flowers on the bottom.

I have to say that out of all the projects we have done, this is maybe the one I am most proud of. :-)

Here is Jessi's. No one did a cake like hers... I thought it was different and very elegant.

Here is a close up of the top of her cake.

This one is Monica's. We decided that her cake is for a couple getting Maui'ed...

And the lovely Pharyn's...

This one is Vicki's. She took the idea from one of Martha Stewart's cakes. I absolutely love Orchids.

Here is a close up of her detailed work.

While Chef was grading, Pharyn and Monica took a moment to show you the do's and dont's of Le Cordon Bleu school uniform. Monica is wearing black socks, while Pharyn, ahem, is wearing socks with ice cream cones on them. Shame shame.

This is Kimberly's cake.

... And Henry's...

Here is a close up of Henry's awesome Stargazers.

This one is Nika's. It is incredibly well done and she got 100% on it. She put SO much work into it.

Erica's...

And then I gave the girls a ride back to their cars... There was not a single square inch of room left after we managed to get our bags and cakes into the CRV.

Next week we begin plated desserts which I'm really looking forward to because that is what you really need to know how to do when you work in a restaurant... More details on that to come... But before I go, I want to give a little shout out to my brand new cousin, Eli Samuel Kestin!!! I can't wait to meet you!!!